Sasuke of the Leaf
by OfTheLeaf
Summary: Sasuke never joined Orochimaru and instead turned down the Sound Ninja 5's offer after his talk with Kakashi. Orochimaru and Kabuto are still at large, The Akatsuki's plot remains unchanged and Sasuke still desires to avenge his clan and to kill Itatchi. Will Sasuke become strong enough to beat Itatchi? Will his friendship with Naruto be enough to forgive the Leaf if he does?
1. The Reunion of Team Seven

The great stone archway of the Hidden Leaf village had never looked so much like home to the returning shinobi, but even the intricately carved designs on its stone sides could not distract Naruto Uzumaki from the scents and smells coming from the Ichiraku Ramen restaurant that he had not been able to visit and eat at for the past two years. As Naruto had inhaled the last bite of his BBQ Pork ramen he was reminded of something his friend Choji would say; remembering this he realized what he had really been missing over the past two years since his private training course with pervy sage - His comrades in team 7.

Naruto leaned back on his wooden stool dangerously far and it creaked threateningly. He wondered how Sakura's training with Lady Tsunade had gone that he had heard about from Pervy Sage or if Sasuke and Kakashi had made any progress. A wide grin cracked Naruto face as he was thought about showing his best friend and arch rival that he had at last overtaken him with the new jutsu he had developed with Jiraiya.

"Prepare yourself Sasuke! Because the future Hokage of the Hidden Leaf is going to best you once more with my new jutsu!" Naruto shouted to the restaurant quite confidently.

"I don't recall you besting me once." Was the calm and confident reply that came from an all too familiar voice in the doorway. Naruto leaned back in surprise and the back legs of his stool snapped apart and sent him falling comically backwards and out the open door behind him into the dust outside the restaurant.

"Smooth one, Loser." Sneered Sasuke, although today even his melancholic demeanour was broken by the reunion of his best friend. He smiled shyly and offered out a hand to help Naruto back up.

Naruto stared up at him through the dust cloud that had formed around him and had to block the sun with an outstretched hand. For a second Naruto thought he had misheard the voice and that it was actually Kakashi. Sasuke had settled on a new outfit since Naruto's departure those couple of years ago; He was wearing black shin-length pants and his exposed leg was bandaged tightly, on his right leg he had some ninja tools in a pack, and his hair looked like an electric current had been run through it as it was standing up in more of a gravity-defying state than usual. If not for the trademark Uchiha shirt with his clan's symbol on its back instead of Kakashi's usual vest Naruto would have assumed Kakashi had suddenly turned gothic.

"Come on. Lady Tsunade is apparently gathering us for something, Sakura too. You can tell me all about this _all powerful_ jutsu on the way" Sasuke jeered.

"You'll just have to wait and see."

"That's fine by me." So they walked over to the meeting point and saw Sakura leaning coyly outside the building that Lady Tsunade was in.

"Oh my god, Sasuke! I haven't seen you in months!" She said with a bit too much enthusiasm for Sasuke's liking. Even without using his sharingan he saw Naruto's face fall slightly in disappointment.

"Apparently Naruto's got a new jutsu up his sleeve, but he's keeping it quiet… for once" Sasuke told her. It was enough to refocus Sakura's attention on Naruto for a bit.

"Oh! I didn't recognise you Naruto! You've gotten so much taller!" She did actually feel bad for not noticing him and gave him a hug to make up for it that quickly restored Naruto's spirits.

"Don't worry about it Sakura! 'Cause everyone in the village is going to notice me after they see my new jutsu!"

The three friends entered the building together to see what they had been asked there for. Inside Tsunade told them.

"It's been a long time since I saw you three together." She stated "I've called you here today to test your abilities after your training to see if you have actually made any progress over the past few years.

"Name the challenge Granny Tsunade and I will beat it!" Grinned Naruto as he started to radiate with energy at the chance of getting to show off just how far he had come to everyone.

"There's someone I want you to go up against, I've kept him off missions especially for this, and your opponent will be -"

"-Me." Kakashi appeared in the doorway with the exact same casual stance and timing that Naruto remembered him for.

"Kakashi!" Naruto yelled "does this mean you'll be my opponent?"

"I'm not just fighting you" Kakashi chuckled "I'm fighting all three of you, however Sasuke I'm afraid I'm going to have the advantage over you, considering I've been the one training you up until a few months ago."

"Oh yeah, Sensei? Well I've learnt something new in that time that I'm sure will surprise you." Sasuke replied. Naruto had been hoping to get people excited and waiting for his new jutsu but now it was all he could do to keep his mind off seeing Sasuke's.

Kakashi led them to the site of their first test and held up two silver bells on thin red ribbons.

"Don't jump the gun this time, Loser" chuckled Sasuke

"Yeah, like I'd do that twice" said Naruto sarcastically.

Kakashi smiled through his mask and gave the signal.

"Ready? Start!"


	2. The Results of Training

Naruto instantly popped up a shadow clone and started channelling a basic rasengan, he ran it towards Kakashi who reacted instantly and disarmed Naruto holding him in a locked position. The Naruto in his hands suddenly vanished into shadow and Naruto was behind Kakashi with a blade to his back. "I can't believe how much he's changed" thought Kakashi from his nearby hideaway as he watched Naruto curse loudly as his clone vanished much like Naruto's had.

Suddenly a rain of kunai hailed down on Kakashi and he substituted out just in time, he had forgotten that Sasuke was indeed his own student and knew quite as much about his own limitations as Kakashi knew about his. It was perhaps time to go on the offensive, so Kakashi started throwing Kunai and Shuriken of his own and engaging the three periodically, one by one, in rounds of sparring, he was glad he had dodged the first of Sakura's attacks as it had reduced the tree she hit accidentally to splinters and even Kakashi decided it best not to allow himself to be hit by her.

The Sun was starting to set and the three team mates were starting to realise this would be a lost fight if they kept letting Kakashi slip away at the last moment.

"Tell me what your new Jutsu is Naruto" Sasuke said with a glimmer in his red sharingan eyes that told Naruto he had the beginnings of a plan.

Kakashi tilted his head curiously at the determined looking faces of Naruto and Sasuke standing in front of him and decided to save the trash talking until after he figured out what they were up to. Naruto suddenly summoned a few shadow clones and began channelling a rasengan… but this was different, for his new jutsu was the…

"Wind Boulder Rasengan!" and the giant, powerful orb of wind suddenly rolled at Kakashi with tremendous speed. Kakashi could think of two possible escapes and with Sasuke's Fire-style Dragon-Ball Jutsu joining with the ball of wind and becoming more dangerous and powerful than ever those options were reduced to one.

The ground was left scorched and blackened and no sign of life was anywhere, and also no place to hide. So where was Kakashi hiding? Sakura figured it out and pushed the confused boys aside. There was no way in hell she was going to let herself become a dead-weight member of any team, ever again. She suddenly stopped and punched the ground with a blast so hard that Naruto and Sasuke were knocked over and huge shards of ground exploded upwards as if it were a sheet of glass. None were more surprised that Kakashi who had been discovered sitting uncomfortably in the newly exposed underground, his hair had been burnt by the last attack and his eye was wide with shock for a moment.

"Found you sensei." Sakura beamed. Kakashi regained his cool and replied with a series of hand signs that even Sasuke didn't recognise.

"Some new trick apparently." He grumbled as they faced the large cube of solid looking rock that had cropped up around Kakashi in an instant. Sakura could not break the wall and even Naruto's new jutsu didn't leave a dent.

"Maybe if you use your Chidori at the same time as my Rasengan we could break it open" suggested Naruto.

"Stand back, loser." Was Sasuke's reply to that suggestion. Sasuke then held is right arm with his left and focused up a strong Chidori, he then raised his arm and exhaled slowly, Naruto and Sakura watched with undisguised fascination when suddenly the Chidori reformed into a long, slim, and tweeting sword of white lightning. "Chidori Blade!" Sasuke exclaimed as he sliced a neat door frame out of Kakashi's protective box.

Inside Kakashi had just shoved a handful of food pills in his mouth to try regain some chakra as his new defensive jutsu used up more than a reasonable amount of his chakra. The students looked at him with puzzled expressions. Kakashi _the great copy-cat ninja of the leaf_ had been forced to resort to stuffing his face in a final-defence box with no chakra left and the top half of his hair burnt to ashes. Naruto and Sasuke exchanged a glance with each other then all four members of Team Seven burst into laughter and fell to the floor.

Naruto Uzumaki truly had missed his home in the village hidden in the leaves.


	3. Sasuke's Favourite Place

_Authors Note: (just skip it if you're too badass for it)_

_Hello! I'm pretty happy that I've gotten a few views already :) really makes me feel good cause I can pretend you all like my story so far… even if you don't actually… if anyone has any advice please post a review or private message me – positive or negative. It all helps. One more thing; I'm using Microsoft Word 2010 and I don't really like how the spacing gets converted when it gets published? It makes my lines of dialogue look weirdly spaced apart so any advice on fixing that would be really helpful as I'm brand new to the fan fiction thing :D_

A few months passed and team sevens reunion had already begun to do wonders for the village hidden in the leaves. They accepted all their missions and had begun to get a reputation for success; Kakashi _the copycat ninja_, Sakura _the young Lady Tsunade_, Sasuke _of the Uchiha_, and Naruto _that crazy blonde guy_ formed a formidable force. Sasuke and Naruto had been training together, mostly, for the past two months.

Lines of sweat were dripping down and off his face; down past his red eyes which scouted the area seeing absolutely any movement. What they couldn't see, however, was Naruto Uzumaki.

"How is this so difficult when he wears that bloody, bright-orange jumpsuit" thought Sasuke tiredly. Suddenly he saw the faintest, unnatural movement of a leaf in a high up tree and send a barrage of fire style and sharpened shurikins to investigate it. A solitary ginger cat fell from the tree, whiskers burnt and eyes wide with fear.

"Oh. It's just you" Sasuke said with a smile "now where the hell is …"

"… ONE! TWO! THREE! HOME!" shouted Naruto from the tree behind Sasuke. In that instance that Sasuke had let his guard down for the cat Naruto had made his move.

"You're getting better" said Sasuke "but not _that much_ better." The tree suddenly faded as if it were a mirage and reappeared back on the other side of Sasuke.

"He's getting better at genjutsus" Naruto sighed internally then grinned "But I'm not done yet!"

The two friends chased each other, Sasuke darting in and out with fast aggressive attacks and Naruto blocking and side stepping in a fast-paced dance through the trees until they both collapsed; Naruto a few inches from the tree and Sasuke a few inches from Naruto.

"Call it a draw?" they both asked each other at the same time and they started laughing with the last of their breath. After three hours spent on just that one round of the game following a full day of serious training together they were beat and decided to head back to the village for something to eat.

Outside Ichiraku Ramen they ran into Shikamaru who told them of some new Intel about the Akatsuki's movements and that Itatchi had been seen moving around the Land of Fire that the not too far away from the Hidden Leaf village. Sasuke suddenly dragged Naruto away from Ichiraku Ramen against quite a struggle for such a tired shinobi.

"Come on Naruto! I'm showing you _my _favourite place to eat for a change." Sasuke dragged him quite far across town, literally, as Naruto refused to do anything more than sit on the ground in a curled up ball and complain about not getting any Ramen. Sasuke picked up two orders of spiced rice and shredded teriyaki chicken and continued to drag Naruto over to where the abandoned Uchiha Village still stood. Sasuke stopped talking and Naruto stood up, embarrassed for acting so childishly when he saw where Sasuke had taken him. They sat by a lake that was closer than Naruto suspected to Sasuke's old home.

Sasuke dropped some pebbles into the water, the ripples reminded him of those caused by him when he showed his dad his mastered fire-style fire-ball jutsu and had begun to receive his respect. Sasuke was silent and sad but he refused to cry in front of his friend. Naruto was so shocked that Sasuke had, out of the blue, decided to share this private corner of the world with him that he had done and said nothing useful except eat his food solemnly. At Sasuke's latest lonely tremble, one that Naruto recognised all too well from moments in his own life, he moved closer to Sasuke and hugged him tightly. They sat there in between the stars and the reflections of the stars on the lake and thought of their loneliness, their loss, and of each other's loneliness. They sat there; Naruto holding Sasuke and Sasuke with his eyes shut, dipping his toes into the cool lake's waters, for quite some time.


	4. A Hiss in the Dark

Dry, dark blood stained the ground leading up to the cave, limbs and bodies covered with dozens of small stab wounds in little pairings were scattered around the wide entrance of the cave and throughout its opening chamber. Ice, water, ashes, and rock plastered the walls and roof of its tunnels or covered the floor which was also littered with Kunai, Shurikins and Blades.

A body crawled out of the tunnel, mere luck and will power were the only reason this Shinobi still had life left in him and he knew it. He unravelled a small scroll and felt around for his slender, wooden-handled brush which was the last ninja tool he had left in his possession. He had no ink left but was determined to send this message. He reached up slowly and unravelled his headband and removed the fractured metal forehead protector pieces from it. He took the sharpest looking piece and while biting hard down on the cloth from the headband so as to not reveal his position to the enemy he forced the shard of metal to add a new, bleeding cut to his body.

Each stroke of the brush sent bursts of pain throughout his body and as he drew nearer to death his body gave up on him more and more and begged for the numb embrace of death. With his last breath he uttered

"Ninja art: super beast scroll." Then he was silent. The jutsu sent the words on the page crawling and squirming together where they formed a red and inky-looking rat that sniffed the air suspiciously then scurried off to the nearby Hidden Leaf village.

A solitary shadow stretched across the back wall of the cave. Its caster looked un amused as a sleek, white snake coiled it's way around his slender fingers. His eyes shone with an unforgiving glower as he remembered bitterly that he was stuck in this weak body for only a few more days when he could finally claim his rightful host.

"If Sssssssasuke thinks he can avoid me and deny me his body then this time I will sssimply have to _take it_" His fingers burst into angry snakes that coiled themselves together into a throbbing, venomous fist as he spat out the last two words.

He had remained still and inactive for far too long now.

The Snake of the Sound was about to strike.


End file.
